


There Was a Hole in Their Hearts

by ChildofMyth



Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Fix-It, Gen, It was going to be longer, Louie secretly goes to Donald for emotional support, This is really just a fix-it fic that followed s02e17 and s02e24 that had the GALL, and texts him a lot concerning his thoughts and feelings, and useless, as in Dewey gets called the most because hes usuall the one most likely to be in trouble, but i dont know if or when i would get around to continuing it, i headcanon the boys and Donald have a much deeper relationship in a way specific to each kid, its also bee in my drafts since the month following Moonvasion, obviously, see if i can get any peer approval and recognition during my time, sitting around depressed as shit, so i decided to throw it out here and, stated clearly here, thanks corona, to suggest the kids wouldn't realize something was wrong with Uncle Donald
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:21:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23651503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChildofMyth/pseuds/ChildofMyth
Summary: "Think about it. When, in our whole lives, has Uncle Donald ever NOT been in contact with us, even for just one day?"Huey was standing, pacing actually, in front of his brothers and Webby, all seated on the bottom bunk. Dewey and Louie shared a look, realizing that their brother was making an uncomfortable amount of sense.They could all feel something, a cold seed of dread, deep in the pits of their stomachs.Uncle Donald was just relaxing on the cruise...Right?
Relationships: Dewey Duck & Donald Duck & Huey Duck & Louie Duck, Donald Duck & Dewey Duck, Donald Duck & Huey Duck, Donald Duck & Louie Duck
Comments: 18
Kudos: 284





	There Was a Hole in Their Hearts

It started with Huey.

Something felt wrong to him and he just couldn't seem to stop staring down at his returned postcard. He read it over and over again, agonizing over every word he'd written there just a few days earlier, until he had the whole thing memorized, address and all.

Why had it been returned? It didn't feel right. He had the message, the address written down, a picture-perfect greeting and farewell (while he had, as usual when he wrote, written a LOT onto the tragically small piece of mail, leaving the end of his message to suddenly condense and squish down more than the beginning, the greeting and farewell were still picture-perfect in his opinion), and not a single misspelled word to be seen.

(The post office wouldn't return something because of a misspelling in the body of the message, maybe the address but not the body, he knew that. But at this point he was looking for any possible reason why it came back to him.)

He checked the mailing address of the cruise three times before he even sent it. It was right.

He checked it again.

Still right.

He read the postcard again.

Still returned.

It felt like the longer he held it, the heavier the paper was becoming, the inked out words weighing heavily, the return stamp in the corner dragging it down.

Or rather the implications of the return stamp is what weighed the most to him.

Why didn't it go through to Uncle Donald? Why was it returned?

Why hadn't _they_ gotten a postcard from _him_ yet?

He started to read it one more time: 

_Dear Uncle Donald,_

_Too much has happened to fit onto one postcard, so I'll have to wait to tell you when you get back rather than send you a series of postcards. (Uncle Scrooge says it's not a good financial decision, since you'll just be home soon and find out everything firsthand, so he won't pay for it and I'm pretty sure I'll write too much to afford that many postcards myself.) So make sure to come home soon so I can tell you face-to-face!_

That's as far as he got this time before clutching the card to his chest.

He needed to try and press _something_ into the aching feeling growing there.

-

Dewey was the second to suspect something. Sure, he'd been the first to suggest Uncle Donald was missing and go on that mission with Webby, but he had just made up a mystery because he was bored.

(Or maybe he had suspicions then too, deep down, and just ignored them until later. He didn't typically sweat the small stuff, that's not how he Dewey's things. Rather he leaves the paranoia to Huey, who was much better at handling it anyways.)

Dewey was always the first one Donald checked up on when he was away, since the blue duck was the most reckless of the trio and the most likely to be in trouble. Dewey knew to keep his phone ringer on when it came to the three of them, used to the regular calls from their Uncle, even finding comfort in them.

His call history was emptier than usual though. He sat, looking at his phone screen, waiting for more numbers to load. 

Surely it hadn't been _that_ long since Uncle Donald had last called him, right?

But all of the numbers were loaded already.

Donald hadn't called since before he left for his cruise.

Dewey frowned deeper and swiped to his uncle's contact, thumb hovering over the call button. Uncle Donald always answered when they called, whether it was an emergency or not. He always made sure they knew they could contact him, no matter what.

He would pick up if Dewey called.

He had to.

Dewey locked his phone and pocketed the device, pressing down his surging anxieties growing like a weight in his stomach. He was thinking things over too much, Uncle Donald was just enjoying his cruise. He'd call them soon.

Best not to bother him.

(Besides, what would he do if Donald didn't answer?)

-

Louie was last but only because he was so distracted lately. Recent events and even more recent emotions left him dizzy with new information to process. Their mom was back, Uncle Donald was gone, things were happening too quickly, he wished it would all just slow down a little.

So, he noticed the signs last.

(He noticed them first actually. Out of the three, Louie was the one to text Donald the most, finding a quiet comfort in even a one word reply from his Uncle. He knew the day Della came home, when Louie texted him: **[Mom is back.]** followed by, **[I don't know how to feel...]** )

(When Donald didn't reply that day, Louie could feel it, that something was wrong. But he pushed it down, refused to admit it to himself, continued to text his uncle like he would reply at any moment.)

(He never did.)

(Louie couldn't admit it to himself until much later, because if he did acknowledge it, it would mean it was real; and if it was real, it meant he really was alone with this torrent of confusing emotions surrounding his mom.)

(And so, Louie was the last to notice.)

His text thread with his uncle was barren, full of bubbled texts aligned to the right of his screen, void of any on the left.

He wanted more than anything to talk to Donald, to ask him what to do, to be wrapped up in his arms and know things would be okay.

But there was no reply.

Louie backed out of their personal thread and instead opened up the group chat that had the four of them in it: Donald, Huey, Dewey, and Louie.

There was the last text he received from his uncle: **[Made it to the bus stop, just have to wait now. You boys be good for Uncle Scrooge. I love you.]**

Each triplet chimed in with a, **[Yes Uncle Donald.]** or a, **[Have a fun cruze!!!]** or, **[love you 2]**

( **[It's spelled 'cruise', Dewey.]** Was the last text in the chat, courtesy of Huey.)

Louie let his finger linger over Donald's words; then he exited the conversation and opened up his and Donald's personal thread again, thumbs tapping out a quick message.

**[cant wait to hear all of ur cruise stories. i bet theyre even better than uncle gladstones]**

A simple text, carrying no weight at the surface level. But it was there to entice. Uncle Donald loved to try and one-up Gladstone when it came to the boys; he wanted to be someone they could look up to and think was a good role-model, not his bum of a cousin Gladstone Gander. Louie knew that, he knew if he mentioned Gladstone, Donald would be sure to reply.

So he waited, staring at the screen.

And waited.

_Text back_ , he willed in his head. _Text back, text back, Uncle Donald, please text me back!_

Louie hoped.

He wished.

He prayed.

No text came.

He moved to write another message, fingers trembling this time, throat squeezing around rising tears.

**[i miss you]**

There was no reply.


End file.
